Hardaway Vows To `Take Major Role' Vs. Bulls

He can get a shot just about whenever he wants, both posting up smaller players and taking bigger players outside. His feel for the game is uncanny.

He'll be the most talented player when the NBA Eastern Conference finals between the Bulls and Orlando Magic open Sunday.

The most talented player other than Michael Jordan, that is.

It's the Magic's Anfernee "Penny" Hardaway. He's as versatile as Scottie Pippen, potentially as able a scorer as Jordan.

Magic Johnson says Hardaway reminds him of himself.

Pat Riley sees a lot of Oscar Robertson in Hardaway.

Others see a combination of Earl Monroe and David Thompson.

Still others see a shy, overly sensitive, insecure kid who suffers under the notion that Shaquille O'Neal is the star of the Magic and Horace Grant is its leader.

"I'm going to have to take a major role in this series," Hardaway said Friday. "Last year (against the Bulls), I wasn't really a big factor. Horace played so great and took us over the hump. This year I have to play a bigger part."

Hardaway will get the defensive assignment on Pippen, which is pivotal because when Pippen is effective, the Bulls are virtually unbeatable.

When Pippen struggles, the Bulls struggle.

"He's their all-around guy, defense, rebounding, handling the ball, getting them into their offense," said Hardaway. "As great a defensive team as Chicago is, they don't like pressure on them. Jordan, as great as he is, and Pippen, as great as he is, they don't seem to like to be pressured when they handle the ball."

Hardaway, at 6 feet 7 inches, is a versatile scorer. He has been getting the postup calls late in games because of O'Neal's poor free-throw shooting.

"I'm going to post up as much as possible," said Hardaway, "make Scottie and Michael uncomfortable. They don't like guards posting them up, so I'll do it.

"I'll take what's given to me. If it's to score 25 or 30, I'll do that. If not, I'll do it on the defensive end, the little things and to help out rebounding. Whatever it takes."

Hardaway is one of the few players in the NBA, as are Jordan and Pippen, capable of playing every facet of the game.

He's a premier ballhandler and an excellent three-point shooter.

He ranks among the best rebounders at guard with more than four per game--5.1 in the playoffs--and he averages more than seven assists per game.

He has a shoe named for him and a big-time series of TV commercials featuring his supposed alter ego, "L'il Penny," a smart-aleck talking puppet that supposedly reflects the personal side of the distant Hardaway.

This series, with Grant tied up with Dennis Rodman and O'Neal battling four Bulls centers, may give Hardaway the chance to command the national spotlight.

When O'Neal missed the first 22 games of the season with a broken thumb, the Magic went 17-5 and Hardaway won three games with last-second shots. When O'Neal returned, Hardaway went back to dropping the ball in the post, waiting for double teams.

The Bulls won't double team, at least not that much, so this may be Hardaway's time.

"I want to be the best," Hardaway said recently. "Like people say Michael Jordan is the best. I want them (eventually) to say that about me."

Raised by a grandmother when his mother left him at age 9 to pursue a career as a lounge singer, Hardaway lived in a cramped house in Memphis with nine aunts and uncles. He shared a bed with his grandmother until he was almost 10.

It's not surprising, then, that he's painfully sensitive, still harboring wounds from being booed when selected by the Magic in the 1993 draft and that he was greedy in seeking a $70 million contract. He has overreacted at times to the mildest of criticisms and once was haunted by a fear of choking on food so much that he developed a condition that affected his ability to swallow.

He sat out his freshman year at Memphis State because he was academically ineligible and resents suggestions he isn't intelligent (he developed into an honors student).

At 24, he's undeniably the NBA's most gifted young player. He just never has taken over a big series like Jordan or Johnson or Robertson or Monroe could.

Now is his chance.

"In watching the film of them playing Miami and New York," noted Hardaway, "the guard play wasn't good enough to win against the Bulls. I think we'll have better success."